Combined frictional and positively locking clutch.



. A. LATHAM.

COMBINED FRIGTIONAL AND POSITIVBLY LOOKING GLU'ILGH'.

APPLIOATION FILED SEPT. 2,1908. 1

' Patented May 10, 1910- WITNESSES.-

ATTORNEY.

A. LATHAM. COMBINED FRIGTIONAL AND POSITIVELY LOOKING CLUTCH.

APPLICATION FILED SEPT.2,190B.

2 SHEETS-SHEET 2.

m VENTOR, afferfjai ma A T T ORNE Y Patented May 10, 1910.

IV] T/VESSLES:

UNlTED STATES PATENT @Fhllfihl.

ALBERT LATHAM, OF BEVERLY, MASSACHUSETTS, ASSIGNOR OF ONE-HALF TO JAMES W. NOURBOURNE, OF SOMERVILLE, MASSACHUSETTS.

COMBINED FRICTIONAL AND POSITIVELY LOCKING CLUTCH.

Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented May to, 19116 Applicetion filed September 2, 1908. Serial No. 451,356..

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, ALmcn'r Livrinmr, a citizen of the United States of America, and resident of Beverly, in the county of Suffolk and State of Massachusetts, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Combined Frictional and Positively Locking Clutches, of which the following is a full, clear, and exact description.

The object of this invention is particularly to provide aclutch which, at pleasure, may be operative as a friction clutch, or both as a friction and a positively locked clutch for the acquircn'ient of the advantage of fiexi bility in operation, that is that the clutching elements may, initially, be engaged through the medium of friction shoes when the power or transmission shaft is first connected with the element to be driven,the driving and driven elements thereafter having the capability of being, by the clutch, positively mechanically interlocked as may be more desirable after the driven part has fully partakcn of the rot-ative movement of the driving )ar't. Such a clutch is of especial avail: )ility in a speed and power transmission device for automobiles as tending to obviate all violence, jolting, gear teeth grinding or other destructive act-ion heretofore commonly experienced in the generally employed sliding gear transmission mechanism; The clutch is, however, equally useful and advantageous in othersituations.

The invention consists in the combination and arrangement of parts and the constructions of certain of the parts all substantially as hereinafter fully described and set forth in the claims.

In the drawings z-Figure1is a plan view of the clutch. Fig. 2 is a horizontal. section of the same on the plane of its axis. Fig. 3 is a perspective view showing the parts of the clutch in separated relations. Fig. 4 is a vertical cross sectional view on line i t, Fig. 2. Fig. 5 is a partial section and plan view showing a particular relative position of the friction shoe contracting bar herein after noted.

Similar characters of reference indicate corresponding parts in allof the views.

In the drawings,A represents a shaft about which the clutch has an encircling engagement, one member of the clutch being affixed to, and non-rotative relatively to the shaft, while the other clutch member is loose,

normally, relatively to the shaft, but susceptible of compulsory rotation with the shaft when engaged or interlocked with the relatively nonrotative member.

The normally loose clutch member a is made of a cup-shape that is, it has the form of a disk with a right-angularly extended annular flange 12. The cup-shaped clutch member has a gear wheel let formed as part of or affixed to its back 10, and it is provided in its back with a socket parallel with its axis.

Adjacent the circular clutch member is a support for the coacting or fellow clutch devices, the same con'lprising altub 32 fitting over the shaft which is made with the iongitudinally continuous spline ribs 33 which are especially provided for the sliding but non-rotatable engagement of the clutch operating collar f in relation to the transmission shaft. Each of said hubs has a socketcd boss 3st receiving therein a plug endwise recessed to straddle the spline rib of shaft A and entering a socket 36 made transversely within the side of the shaft; and said interlocking plug is confined in place by the screw plug 37 threading into the sockcted boss 34. The hub 32 of the a forcsaid support has radially extending members -10 and 42 in line with each other and the radially extended member ll at right angles to the line of the members and 4-2, the portion at being elongated in a line parallel with the axis of shaft A and made with a circular bore 45 extending from end to end therethrough.

On the member 4:0 of the clutch device support a pair of approximately SGll1lCll-" cular friction shoes 50, 50, are connected by a common pivot 52, said shoes having lugs 53 adjacent their connecting pivot, therebelow and in a suitable degree of separation. The position of the friction shoes and cross shaped supporting structure therefor is within the space inclosed by the flange rim 12 of the proximate circular clutch member aso that when the friction shoes are expanded they will bind against the inner surface of the rim l2; and the free ends of the friction shoes are reduced in width, as rep resented at 55 and are made with beveled corners, as represented at 56. The other end of the portion 42 of the support has a recess 57 thereacross in a line parallel with the shaft, the same being intersected at right angles by another recess 58 in which fit the narrowed ex :eniities no of the friction shoes. Said recess forms a slideway for the "friction shoe expanding bar soon to be more particularly described. In the bore li-5 of the aforesaid supportingstructure is a lmigitudinally slidable locking bolt 61- which is made n th a solid inner end an? otherwise tubal nopcning to its outer end and formed. with an internal screw thread (see 2). v v The clutch device has for action adjacent thereto and in conjunction therewith the collar d eply annularly grooved, and while free for endwisc play along he shaftwhich it surrounds, it can have no rotary movement independently of such sha ft because of its e1 ncmont with the aforesaid spline rib l collar carries a lOI udinally extending stud having a. head enlargement (it; cnga ed within the tubular bolt (ll and in coma t against a spiral spring (37 within the latter and in endwise beii'ng against the solid inner end of the bolt. An annular plug (58, screw engaging into the threaded orifice of the tubular bolt, forms an abutment tor the bolt head (36 and yet allows the stud to play endwise inwardly independently relatively to the bolt. The bolt and alincd stud are as far radially ofil'sct from the axis of the transmission shaft as is the aforementioned socket 30 in the back of the circular clutch member, definitely shown in Fig. 2, and in a manner indicated in Fig. 3-. The aforesaid collar f carries, as i rigid longitudinal extension thereof parillel with the transmission shaft and alined with the aforementioned recess 57 in the end of the member 42 of the support, the shoe expending; bar (30, the end of which is beveled or made of wedge shape and the end portidn of which plays in the aforemem tinned recess 5'7; when the collar is moved; in a jironer degree toward the back of the circular clutch member, the free end n rtion of the bar will enter between and t pend the friction shoes setting them in their bind against the inner surface of the flange of clutch member a.

Diametrically opposite but ranglng parallel with the friction shoe expanding bar (50 is a. friction shoe contracting bar 70, the same having an engagement in suitable time and during the endwise movcn'ient of the cellar vhicl carries it with the aforementioned lugs 5 with the result of applying lions so that when the collar is forced to move the bars toward one of the circular clutch members sufficiently far to bring the shoe expander into engagement between the ends oi? the shoes, a shoe contracting bar will have passed inwardly beyond and out of engagement with the aforesaid lugs 53, and vice versa; and in Figs. 3 and 5, the relations of the parts are understood to be those when the collar f is moved endwise away from the clutch member, freeing the shoes so that they may be contracted, the portions 72 of the contracting bar 70 being shown in the engagement with the lever lugs 53 to positively inwardly swing the shoes.

The bars and are made with their extremities of maximum width and na'rrowed to the rear of such wide portions and the bars are longitudinally split or slotted, as represented at and capable of adjustment, as may be accomplished by the abutting inner ends of screws 76 which oppositely penetrate the portions of the bar at either side of the slot. By reason of the capability of adjustment of the bars 60 and 70 as to their widths, compensation. is provided for wear between. the engaging OX-P tremities of the bars and the parts of the friction shoes with which they coact.

The construction for interengaging relations of the friction shoe extremities and the expanding-bar 60 with the support member 42, the extremity of which 15 recessed on intersecting lines at right angles to'each other provides for a maintaining of the parts always in their proper IGlHtIOHS for a nieety of operation.

The bar 70 in'its arrangement for coact'ion with the lugs 53, 53, of the friction shoes below the pivotal mounting of the latter'q ot only provides for a positive contraction of the friction shoes when they are disengaged by the expanding bar, but it insures that the shoes will remain in their contracted relations, and with no possibility of their being eentrifugally moved while the device is in its normal and unclutched condition.

1. In a clutch a shaft, a cup shaped clutch mei'nber on, and normally rotatively free relatively to the shaft and having a socket in its back, a support allixcd on the shaft carrying one or more friction shoes which have their locations within the rim flange of said clutch member, sold support having a socket parallel with the sh'aft and a slidable loclcin bolt in said socket for coaction with the socicet portion of the cup-shaped clutch member, a' collar slidable along the shaft having a longitmlinally extending member for setting the friction shoes into, and for releasing them from, bind with the rim of the cup slnipedmember and a stud carried l and longitlnliinlllv projecting ll'Olti said f collar and martin with the slitlahle l)t)li.

2. in a clutch, a shalt. a cup-shaped intanher normally relatively free therepn and l|a\ ing' a socket in its hack, a support aliixed on the shaft provided with one or more friction shoes within and (Uttt'llltg with the rim of said cup-shaped 'Itltlltlltl, said support having a socket parall l with the shaft, a slidahle lot-hing bolt in aid socket for coactinn with the. socket ntion oi the cup shaped clutch ineinher a collar slidable along the shaft, having longitudinally extending bars for respectively setting and \vitlnlrawing the friction hoes into and Outo'l bind with the clutch ltltlltlJll riin, a stud carried lrv and longitudinally extended from said collar. alincd and telewopicall engaged with said huh, and a spring' for reaction (i]tl\\'l. tf lieitveen the slttd and bolt.

1 In a clutch a shall, a cup-shaped clutch member normally rotatively free thereon, a support atiixed on the shaft adjacent said clutch 1ne1nher,- comprising a part radially extended having a transverse recess in its outer end and an intersecting recess at such end parallel with the shaft, one or more friction shoes inovably carried by said support, the approached ends of which are 10 ated within said transverse recess, and a collar slidahle along the shaft having av longitudinally extending shoe expanding bar, the extremity of'whieh plays in said intersecting recess of the support and @0- acts with the approached extremities of the shoes. I

Signed by me at Boston, Mass, in presence of two subscribing Witnesses.

ALBERT LATHAM. \Vitnesses J. W. NO RBOURN, M. C. 'NOURBO'URN. 

